Writing Workshops

THE GENRE BLUR!

Write a chapbook in FOUR WEEKS using four hybridized prose forms.

Is it a dramatic monologue or a rant? A prose poem or auto-fiction?

This workshop is for everyone—from literary anarchists to those who only break rules when given valid reasons. It's loosey-goosey experimental, but you'll get clear and structured guidance. And you can take as many or as few literary liberties as you wish.

Whether you're a poet, a playwright, a fiction writer or a creative non-fiction writer, you can use each of these four forms to push the boundaries of your own genre. E.g. If you're a poet, you'll write from the perspective of a poet, and use the forms to generate new and fabulous poetry, if you're a fiction writer, you'll use the new forms to generate fiction. You'll write within your own genre, or you can blur into another, or you can stir them into a clever hybridized soup.

There are many rules, and also none at all.

EXTRA DAY: Wednesday April 2nd
Online Community Reading: 6pm-8pm

PRE-CLASS READING PACKAGES: Beginning MONDAY MARCH 3rd, weekly readings will be organized on a webpage and only accessible to the writers in the class. It'll be easy to navigate and there'll be a full easy-to-follow course schedule.

WHEN WE DISCUSS THE READINGS IN THE PACKAGES we'll ask: how is this piece working? We'll invistigate voice, pacing, style, psychic distance... and of course how does the writing blur between the genres? We'll looking at what the readings are teaching us about the cross-genre form, and if/how they've inspired us. We'll be on the hunt for ways to deepen our own work or solve any problems we encounter.

EACH WEEK WRITERS WILL BRING TWO QUESTIONS TO CLASS ABOUT THE READINGS:
We'll each offer one questions that we already have a good answer to.
And we'll also ask one question that we perhaps don't know the answer to, or that we're not sure about.

PORTFOLIO
We'll dive into writing THREE pieces within each blurry genre (or TWELVE hybridized pieces!)

EXTRAS:

FINAL CLASS READING:
I've added an extra Wednesday (April 2nd) for an online class reading!

PLEASE NOTE: This is a GENERATIVE workshop, not an editing workshop, but...

ONE-ON-ONE EDITING: After each session is over, I'll offer an hour of editing/trouble-shooting time—open to anyone who'd find benefit in 10-15 minutes of immediate one-on-one assistance with one of their genre blurred pieces.

CLASS SCHEDULE: You'll be given a clear and easy-to-use class schedule to help you allocate writing, reading and revising time in your week.

TAKE-HOME PROMPTS to get you thinking and writing during the week (the readings will also inspire you!)

This is my favourite workshop to teach! I've taught it at The University of Victoria, I've taught it live and online, and I'm excited to offer it to YOU!

TESTIMONIALS

Zoe Dickinson

“I want to say again how grateful I am for this magical feeling of suddenly knowing what I'm doing with this poem! It's really amazing to feel this way and just what I needed to carry me forward on what is shaping up to be a long project. You have such a gift for helping people find their way.”

Boomika Dongol

“You have helped me heal my fear of bigoted workshops and transformed my experience into an enriching and fulfilling one.”

Eric L M Hansen

“I’ve become a big fan of Regehring my writing.”

Nancy Yakimoski

“Thank you so much for an outstanding workshop--and for your thoughtful editing suggestions for my long poem.”

Michelle Poirier Brown

“Thank you, thank you, thank you for this course.”

WORKSHOP NOW FULL!

WHAT TO EXPECT IN THIS WORKSHOP:

Jan 8th: preliminary package arrives!

A fabulous long poem package arrives in your inbox, and if you've don't have a poem in the works, you need to begin writing ON OR BEFORE THIS DAY.

It's important that you already have 6+ pages for the first class on Jan 15th.

Please mark off time this week to WRITE!
Suggested time: 1-2 hours a day Jan 8th-Jan 15th.

BONUS CALL: If you'd like to chat about your ideas or ask questions before the first class, I'm 100% here for you! Please email me HERE and we'll book a complimentary 15-30 min call via phone or my zoom room.

POETS WITH POEMS: If you already have a poem going, you might feel inspired to write more after reading the poems in the package. But if you have 6+ pages, it's okay if you just read the package.

Jan 15th & 22nd: our first & second online meetings

During these two classes we'll divide the time into:

a) discussions about the poems in the packages

b) poem sharing time (we'll look at half the poems on Jan 15th and half the poems on Jan 22nd, and each poet will receive the same amount of time. If you are not ready to share, or you don't want to, that's 100% okay too.)

c) writing time

WHEN WE DISCUSS THE POEMS IN THE PACKAGES: we'll focus on the structure, style, narrative or non-linear techniques, etc., used in their construction (not the meaning or the minutia of craft). We'll ask ourselves how/if they engage us as readers and how/if they manage to carry us forward through ten+ pages. We're looking at what the poems can teach us about this form, and how they might solve our own long poem problems, or show us how to improve our poems. We'll be on the hunt for ways to expand our own poems, or "write into" gaps we've identified in our poems. We'll also be looking and listening for ways to deepen our own work.

WHEN WE SHARE INDIVIDUAL POEMS: each poet will be invited to share a little about their long poem, talk about challenges they're facing, and pose questions/problems, and then screenshare their poem. I will offer feedback, as well as safely guiding any suggestions, if the poet is open to receiving this. We will always begin with what's working and what we admire.

PLEASE SCHEDULE 1+ hour a day for writing/editing your long poem on both the weeks of the 15th and 22nd.

Jan 29th: our final online meeting

We'll spend the 2.5 hours looking at every poem (time will be distributed fairly between all poets). You can read your poem aloud, screenshare it, and we'll address any questions or concerns you still have.
AFTER THIS CLASS you'll have two more days to finesse them ready for sending to the contest: PLEASE be sure to schedule time in your calendar for your own personal editing on Jan 29th & 30th. And PLEASE add a reminder to submit on either Jan 30th or Feb 1st.

WORKSHOP FULL!

IS THIS WORKSHOP FOR YOU?

If you have a poem you'd like to write/edit for submission to The Malahat Review's Long Poem Prize (FEB 1st deadline), this is the workshop for you!

If you've NEVER WRITTEN a long poem, this workshop is also for you! (We'll begin writing in advance on Wed Jan 8th...or you can begin now!)

Leading up to each class, we'll read award-winning long poems as structural and technical examples. We'll dive into generative writing, uncover ways to deepen the work, identify possible gaps and "write into" said gaps, and explore ways of stretching your poem. We'll also look at narrative and non-narrative, linear and non-linear methods of writing a long poem.

A long poem is traditionally 10+ pages in length (in the modern tradition). It can be lineated or in prose format, it can be in sections, or one rambling poem of many stanzas. There are no rules per se, but there are plenty of ways to tame this long and unwieldy form.

~

Before being invited to join the editorial board of The Malahat Review, one of my poems was shortlisted for the Long Poem Prize. Later, as a poetry editor for the journal, I was part of the team selecting poems for the shortlist. I know what makes a good long poem, and what gets attention in a contest, and I'd love to share this with you!

MY LONG POEM JOURNEY:

I fell in love with the modern long poem after reading Aurian Haller's winning poem in The Malahat Review. But I'd already been seduced by Beowulf, Tennyson's Idylls of the King, and tackled some of Gilgamesh.

Did you know that the CBC Poetry Awards used to be a Long Poem Prize? It switched to it's present 600 word length back in 2012. I wrote my first long poem in a workshop with Tim Lilburn (who read Dante to us for the first two classes), and that long poem ended up on the CBC longlist in 2009.

I also wrote the beginning of my chapbook, Disassembling A Dancer, the same year. It began as a long prose poem, and most of it was published in Grain Magazine (the chapbook is basically a long poem that's been subtitled).

Cult Life contains two long poems that I eventually split and distributed throughout the book. And I have five other long poems--two in a manuscript under consideration, two in the manuscript I'm presently immersed in, and a floating long poem that doesn't seem to belong anywhere (I'm planning to enter that poem on Feb 1st).

I can't stop writing long poems! I've also edited plenty of long poems for mentees and editing clients, and it's a thrill to see them published or included in books. This workshop is a culmination of all of this experience, as well as my fondness for the form, and it's long overdue.